UNIT I

INTRODUCTION TO COMPILER
1. What is a Complier?
A Complier is a program that reads a program written in one
language-the source language-and translates it in to an equivalent program
in another language-the target language. As an important part of this
translation process, the compiler reports to its user the presence of errors in
the source program.
2. State some software tools that manipulate source program?
i. Structure editors
ii. Pretty printers
iii. Static
iv. Checkers
v. Interpreters.
3. What are the cousins of compiler? April/May 2004, April/May 2005
The following are the cousins of
i. Preprocessors
ii. Assemblers
iii. Loaders
iv. Link editors.
4. What are the main two parts of compilation? What are they
performing?
The two main parts are
Analysis part breaks up the source program into constituent
pieces and create an intermediate representation of the source program.
Synthesis part constructs the desired target program from the
intermediate representation
5. What is a Structure editor?
A structure editor takes as input a sequence of commands to build a
source program. The structure editor not only performs the text creation and
modification functions of an ordinary text editor but it also analyzes the
program text putting an appropriate hierarchical structure on the source
program.
6. What are a Pretty Printer and Static Checker?
A Pretty printer analyses a program and prints it in such a way that
the structure of the program becomes clearly visible.
A static checker reads a program, analyses it and attempts to
discover potential bugs without running the program.
7. How many phases does analysis consists?
Analysis consists of three phases
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i .Linear analysis
ii. Hierarchical analysis
iii. Semantic analysis
8. What happens in linear analysis?
This is the phase in which the stream of characters making up the
source program is read from left to right and grouped in to tokens that are
sequences of characters having collective meaning.
9. What happens in Hierarchical analysis?
This is the phase in which characters or tokens are grouped
hierarchically in to nested collections with collective meaning.
10. What happens in Semantic analysis?
This is the phase in which certain checks are performed to ensure that
the components of a program fit together meaningfully.
11. State some compiler construction tools? April /May 2008
i. Parse generator
ii. Scanner generators
iii. Syntax-directed translation engines
iv. Automatic code generator
v. Data flow engines.
12. What is a Loader? What does the loading process do?
A Loader is a program that performs the two functions
i. Loading
ii .Link editing
The process of loading consists of taking relocatable machine code,
altering the relocatable address and placing the altered instructions and data
in memory at the proper locations.
13. What does the Link Editing does?
Link editing: This allows us to make a single program from several
files of relocatable machine code. These files may have been the result of
several compilations, and one or more may be library files of routines
provided by the system and available to any program that needs them.
14. What is a preprocessor?
A preprocessor is one, which produces input to compilers. A source
program may be divided into modules stored in separate files. The task of
collecting the source program is sometimes entrusted to a distinct program
called a preprocessor.
The preprocessor may also expand macros into source language
statements.
15. State some functions of Preprocessors
i) Macro processing
ii) File inclusion
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iii) Relational Preprocessors

iv) Language extensions

16. What is a Symbol table?

A Symbol table is a data structure containing a record for each
identifier, with fields for the attributes of the identifier. The data structure
allows us to find the record for each identifier quickly and to store or retrieve
data from that record quickly.
17. State the general phases of a compiler
i. Lexical analysis
ii. Syntax analysis
iii. Semantic analysis
iv. Intermediate code generation
v. Code optimization
vi. Code generation
18. What is an assembler?
Assembler is a program, which converts the source language in to
assembly language.
19. What is the need for separating the analysis phase into lexical
analysis and parsing? (Or) What are the issues of lexical analyzer?
Simpler design is perhaps the most important consideration. The
separation of lexical analysis from syntax analysis often allows us to simplify
one or the other of these phases.
Compiler efficiency is improved.
Compiler portability is enhanced.
20. What is Lexical Analysis?
The first phase of compiler is Lexical Analysis. This is also known as
linear analysis in which the stream of characters making up the source
program is read from left-to right and grouped into tokens that are
sequences of characters having a collective meaning.
21. What is a lexeme? Define a regular set. Nov/Dec 2006
` A Lexeme is a sequence of characters in the source program that is
matched by the pattern for a token.
A language denoted by a regular expression is said to be a regular
set.
22. What is a sentinel? What is its usage? April/May 2004
A Sentinel is a special character that cannot be part of the source
program. Normally we use eof as the sentinel. This is used for speeding-up
the lexical analyzer.
23. What is a regular expression? State the rules, which define
regular expression?
Regular expression is a method to describe regular language
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Rules:
1) -is a regular expression that denotes {} that is the set containing
the empty string
2) If a is a symbol in , then a is a regular expression that denotes {a}
3) Suppose r and s are regular expressions denoting the languages
L(r ) and L(s) Then,
a) (r )/(s) is a regular expression denoting L(r) U L(s).
b) (r )(s) is a regular expression denoting L(r )L(s)
c) (r )* is a regular expression denoting L(r)*.
d) (r) is a regular expression denoting L(r ).
24. What are the Error-recovery actions in a lexical analyzer?
1. Deleting an extraneous character
2. Inserting a missing character
3. Replacing an incorrect character by a correct character
4. Transposing two adjacent characters
25. Construct Regular expression for the language
L= {w {a,b}/w ends in abb}
Ans: {a/b}*abb.
26. What is recognizer?
Recognizers are machines. These are the machines which accept the
strings belonging to certain language. If the valid strings of such language
are accepted by the machine then it is said that the corresponding language
is accepted by that machine, otherwise it is rejected.

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UNIT-II
LEXICAL ANALYSIS
1.What is Lexical Analysis?
The first phase of compiler is Lexical Analysis. This is also known as
linear analysis in which the stream of characters making up the source
program is read from left-to-right and grouped into tokens that are
sequences of characters having a collective meaning.
2.What is a lexeme? Define a regular set.
A Lexeme is a sequence of characters in the source program
that is matched by
the pattern for a token.
A language denoted by a regular expression is said to be a
regular set
3.What is a sentinel? What is its usage?
A Sentinel is a special character that cannot be part of the source
program. Normally we use eof as the sentinel. This is used for speedingup the lexical analyzer.
4.What is a regular expression? State the rules, which define regular
expression?
Regular expression is a method to describe regular language.
1) If a is a symbol in ,then a is a regular expression that denotes
{a}
2) Suppose r and s are regular expressions denoting the
languages L(r ) and
L(s)
Then,
a) (r )/(s) is a regular expression denoting L(r)U L(s).
b) (r )(s) is a regular expression denoting L(r )L(s)
c) (r )* is a regular expression denoting L(r)*.
d) (r) is a regular expression denoting L(r ).
5. What are the Error-recovery actions in a lexical analyzer?
1. Deleting an extraneous character
2. Inserting a missing character
3. Replacing an incorrect character by a correct character
4. Transposing two adjacent characters
6. Construct Regular expression for the language
L= {w {a,b}/w ends in abb}
Ans: {a/b}*abb.
7. What is recognizer?
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Recognizers are machines. These are the machines which accept

the strings belonging to certain language. If the valid strings of such
language are accepted by the machine then it is said that the corresponding
language is accepted by that machine, otherwise it is rejected.
8. Differentiate compiler and interpreter.
Compiler produces a target program whereas an interpreter
performs the
Operations implied by the source program.
9. Write short notes on buffer pair.
Concerns with efficiency issues
Used with a look ahead on the input
It is a specialized buffering technique used to reduce the overhead
required to process an input character. Buffer is divided into two N-character
halves. Use two pointers. Used at times when the lexical analyzer needs to
look ahead several characters beyond the lexeme
for a pattern before a
match is announced.
10. Differentiate tokens, patterns, lexeme.
Tokens- Sequence of characters that have a collective meaning.
Patterns- There is a set of strings in the input for which the same token
is produced as output. This set of strings is described by a rule called a
pattern associated with the token
Lexeme- A sequence of characters in the source program that is matched by
the pattern for a token.
11. List the operations on languages.
Union - L U M ={s | s is in L or s is in M}
Concatenation LM = {st | s is in L and t is in M}
Kleene Closure L* (zero or more concatenations of L)
Positive Closure L+ (one or more concatenations of L)
12. Write a regular expression for an identifier.
An identifier is defined as a letter followed by zero or more
letters or digits. The
regular expression for an identifier is given as letter
(letter | digit)*
13. Mention the various notational shorthands for representing
regular expressions.
One or more instances (+)
Zero or one instance (?)
Character classes ([abc] where a, b, c are alphabet
symbols denotes the regular expressions a | b | c.)
Non regular sets
14. What is the function of a hierarchical analysis?
Hierarchical analysis is one in which the tokens are grouped
hierarchically into nested collections with collective meaning. also termed as
Parsing.
15. What does a semantic analysis do?
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Semantic analysis is one in which certain checks are performed

to ensure that
components of a program fit together meaningfully. Mainly
performs type checking.

UNIT III
SYNTAX ANALYSIS
1. Define parser.
Hierarchical analysis is one in which the tokens are grouped
hierarchically into nested collections with collective meaning also termed as
Parsing.
2. Mention the basic issues in parsing.
There are two important issues in parsing.
Specification of syntax.
Representation of input after parsing.
3. Why lexical and syntax analyzers are separated out?
Reasons for separating the analysis phase into lexical and syntax
analyzers:
Simpler design.
Compiler efficiency is improved.
Compiler portability is enhanced.
4. Define a context free grammar.
A context free grammar G is a collection of the following
V is a set of non terminals
T is a set of terminals
S is a start symbol
P is a set of production rules
G can be represented as G = (V,T,S,P)
Production rules are given in the following form
Non terminal (V U T)*
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5. Briefly explain the concept of derivation.

Derivation from S means generation of string w from S. For
constructing
derivation two things are important.
i) Choice of non terminal from several others.
ii) Choice of rule from production rules for corresponding non terminal.
Instead of choosing the arbitrary non terminal one can choose
i) Either leftmost derivation leftmost non terminal in a sentinel form
ii) Or rightmost derivation rightmost non terminal in a sentinel form
6. Define ambiguous grammar.
A grammar G is said to be ambiguous if it generates more than one
parse tree for some sentence of language L(G).
i.e. both leftmost and rightmost derivations are same for the given
sentence.
7. What is a operator precedence parser?
A grammar is said to be operator precedence if it possess the following
properties:
1. No production on the right side is .
2. There should not be any production rule possessing two adjacent
non terminals at the right hand side.
8. List the properties of LR parser.
1. LR parsers can be constructed to recognize most of the
programming languages
for which the context free grammar can be
written.
2. The class of grammar that can be parsed by LR parser is a superset
of class of grammars that can be parsed using predictive parsers.
3. LR parsers work using non backtracking shift reduce technique yet it
is efficient one.
9. Mention the types of LR parser.
SLR parser- simple LR parser
LALR parser- lookahead LR parser
Canonical LR parser
10. What are the problems with top down parsing?
The following are the problems associated with top down parsing:
Backtracking
Left recursion
Left factoring
Ambiguity
11. Write the algorithm for FIRST and FOLLOW.
FIRST
1. If X is terminal, then FIRST(X) IS {X}.
2. If X is a production, then add to FIRST(X).
3. If X is non terminal and X Y1,Y2..Yk is a production, then place a
in FIRST(X) if
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for some i , a is in FIRST(Yi) , and is in all of FIRST(Y1),FIRST(Yi-1);

FOLLOW
1. Place $ in FOLLOW(S), where S is the start symbol and $ is the input
right end marker.
2. If there is a production A B, then everything in FIRST () except
for is placed in FOLLOW (B).
3. If there is a production A B, or a production A B where FIRST
() contains , then everything in FOLLOW (A) is in FOLLOW (B).
12. List the advantages and disadvantages of operator precedence
parsing.
Advantages
This type of parsing is simple to implement.
Disadvantages
1. The operator like minus has two different precedence(unary and
binary).Hence it is
hard to handle tokens like minus sign.
1. This kind of parsing is applicable to only small class of grammars.
13. What is dangling else problem?
Ambiguity can be eliminated by means of dangling-else grammar
which is show below:
stmt if expr then stmt
| if expr then stmt else stmt
| other
14. Write short notes on YACC.
YACC is an automatic tool for generating the parser program.
YACC stands for yet another compiler compiler which is basically the
utility available from UNIX.
Basically YACC is LALR parser generator.
It can report conflict or ambiguities in the form of error messages.
15. What is meant by handle pruning?
A rightmost derivation in reverse can be obtained by handle pruning. If
w is a sentence of the grammar at hand, then w = n, where n is the nth
right sentential form of some as yet unknown rightmost derivation
S = 0 => 1=> n-1 => n = w
16. Define LR (0) items.
An LR (0) item of a grammar G is a production of G with a dot at
some position of the right side. Thus, production A XYZ yields the four
items
A.XYZ
AX.YZ
AXY.Z
AXYZ.
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17. What is meant by viable prefixes?

The set of prefixes of right sentential forms that can appear on the
stack of a shift-reduce parser are called viable prefixes. An equivalent
definition of a viable prefix is that it is a prefix of a right sentential form that
does not continue past the right end of the rightmost handle of that
sentential form.
18. Define handle.
A handle of a string is a substring that matches the right side of a
production, and whose reduction to the non terminal on the left side of the
production represents one step along the reverse of a rightmost derivation.
A handle of a right sentential form is a production A and a
position of where the string may be found and replaced by A to produce
the previous right-sentential form in a rightmost derivation of . That is, if S
=>Aw =>w, then A in the position following is a handle of w.
19. What are kernel & non-kernel items?
Kernel items, which include the initial item, S' .S, and all items
whose dots are not at the left end.
Non-kernel items, which have their dots at the left end.
20. What is phrase level error recovery?
Phrase level error recovery is implemented by filling in the blank
entries in the predictive parsing table with pointers to error routines. These
routines may change, insert, or delete symbols on the input and issue
appropriate error messages. They may also pop from the stack.

UNIT IV
SYNTAX DIRECTED TRANSLATION & RUN TIME
ENVIRONMENT
1. List the different storage allocation strategies.
The strategies are:
Static allocation
Stack allocation
Heap allocation
2. What are the contents of activation record?
The activation record is a block of memory used for managing the
information needed by a single execution of a procedure. Various fields f
activation record are:
Temporary variables
Local variables
Saved machine registers
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Control link
Access link
Actual parameters
Return values

3. What is dynamic scoping?

In dynamic scoping a use of non-local variable refers to the non-local
data declared in most recently called and still active procedure. Therefore
each time new findings are set up for local names called procedure. In
dynamic scoping symbol tables can be required at run time.
4. Define symbol table.
Symbol table is a data structure used by the compiler to keep track of
semantics of the variables. It stores information about scope and binding
information about names.
5. What is code motion?
Code motion is an optimization technique in which amount of code in a loop
is decreased. This transformation is applicable to the expression that yields
the same result independent of the number of times the loop is executed.
Such an expression is placed before the loop.
6. What are the properties of optimizing compiler?
The source code should be such that it should produce minimum
amount of target code.
There should not be any unreachable code.
Dead code should be completely removed from source language.
The optimizing compilers should apply following code improving
transformations on
source language.
i) Common subexpression elimination
ii) Dead code elimination
iii) Code movement
iv) Strength reduction
7. What are the various ways to pass a parameter in a function?
Call by value
Call by reference
Copy-restore
Call by name
8. Suggest a suitable approach for computing hash function.
Using hash function we should obtain exact locations of name in
symbol table.
The hash function should result in uniform distribution of names in
symbol table.
The hash function should be such that there will be minimum number
of collisions.
Collision is such a situation where hash function results in same location for
storing the names.
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9. Define bottom up parsing?

It attempts to construct a parse tree for an input string is beginning at
leaves and working up towards the root (i.e.) reducing a string w to the
start symbol of a grammar. At each reduction step, a particular substring
matching the right side of a production is replaced by the symbol on the left
of that production. It is a rightmost derivation and it s also known as shifts
reduce parsing.
10. What are the functions used to create the nodes of syntax trees?
Mknode (op, left, right)
Mkleaf (id,entry)
Mkleaf (num, val)
11. What are the functions for constructing syntax trees for
expressions?
i) The construction of a syntax tree for an expression is similar to the
translation of the expression into postfix form.
ii) Each node in a syntax tree can be implemented as a record with
several fields.
12. Give short note about call-by-name?
Call by name, at every reference to a formal parameter in a procedure
body the name of the corresponding actual parameter is evaluated. Access is
then made to the effective parameter.
13. How parameters are passed to procedures in call-by-value
method?
This mechanism transmits values of the parameters of call to the
called program. The transfer is one way only and therefore the only way to
returned can be the value of a function.
Main ( )
{print (5);
} Int
Void print (int n)
{ printf (%d, n); }
14. Define static allocations and stack allocations
Static allocation is defined as lays out for all data objects at compile
time. Names are bound to storage as a program is compiled, so there is no
need for a run time support package.
Stack allocation is defined as process in which manages the run time
as a Stack. It is based on the idea of a control stack; storage is organized as
a stack, and activation records are pushed and popped as activations begin
and end.
15. What are the difficulties with top down parsing?
a) Left recursion
b) Backtracking
c) The order in which alternates are tried can affect the language
accepted
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d) When failure is reported. We have very little idea where the

error actually
occurred.
16. Define top down parsing?
It can be viewed as an attempt to find the left most derivation for an
input string. It can be viewed as attempting to construct a parse tree for the
input starting from the root and creating the nodes of the parse tree in
preorder.
17. Define a syntax-directed translation?
Syntax-directed translation specifies the translation of a construct in
terms of Attributes associated with its syntactic components. Syntax-directed
translation uses a context free grammar to specify the syntactic structure of
the input. It is an input- output mapping.
18. Define an attribute. Give the types of an attribute?
An attribute may represent any quantity, with each grammar symbol, it
associates a set of attributes and with each production, a set of semantic
rules for\ computing values of the attributes associated with the symbols
appearing in that production.
Example: a type, a value, a memory location etc.,
i) Synthesized attributes.
ii) Inherited attributes.
19. Give the 2 attributes of syntax directed translation into 3-addr
code?
i) E.place, the name that will hold the value of E and
ii) E.code, the sequence of 3-addr statements evaluating E.
20. Write the grammar for flow-of-control statements?
The following grammar generates the flow-of-control statements, ifthen, if then- else, and while-do statements.
S -> if E
then S1
| If E then S1
else S2
| While E do S1.

UNIT V
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CODE OPTIMISATION AND CODE GENERATION

1. Define code generations with ex?
It is the final phase in compiler model and it takes as an input an
intermediate representation of the source program and output produces as
equivalent target programs. Then intermediate instructions are each
translated into a sequence of machine instructions that perform the same
task.
2. What are the issues in the design of code generator?
Input to the generator
Target programs
Memory management
Instruction selection
Register allocation
Choice of evaluation order
Approaches to code generation.
3. Give the variety of forms in target program.
Absolute machine language.
Relocatable machine language.
Assembly language.
4. Give the factors of instruction selections.
Uniformity and completeness of the instruction sets
Instruction speed and machine idioms
Size of the instruction sets.
5. What are the sub problems in register allocation strategies?
During register allocation, we select the set of variables that will reside
in register at a point in the program. During a subsequent register
assignment phase, we pick the specific register that a variable reside in.
6. Give the standard storage allocation strategies.
Static allocation
Stack allocation.
7. Define static allocations and stack allocations
Static allocation is defined as lays out for all data objects at compile
time. Names are bound to storage as a program is compiled, so there is no
need for a Run time support package.
Stack allocation is defined as process in which manages the run time
as a Stack. It is based on the idea of a control stack; storage is organized as
a stack, and activation records are pushed and popped as activations begin
and end.

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8. Define basic block and flow graph.

A basic block is a sequence of consecutive statements in which flow of
Control enters at the beginning and leaves at the end without halt or
possibility Of branching except at the end. A flow graph is defined as the
adding of flow of control information to the Set of basic blocks making up a
program by constructing a directed graph.
9. Write the step to partition a sequence of 3 address statements
into basic blocks.
1. First determine the set of leaders, the first statement of basic blocks.
The rules we can use are the following.
The first statement is a leader.
Any statement that is the target of a conditional or unconditional
goto is a
leader.
Any statement that immediately follows a goto or conditional
goto statement
is a leader.
2. For each leader, its basic blocks consists of the leader and all
statements
Up to but not including the next leader or the end of the
program.
10. Give the important classes of local transformations on basic
blocks
Structure preservation transformations
Algebraic transformations.
11. Describe algebraic transformations.
It can be used to change the set of expressions computed by a basic
blocks into A algebraically equivalent sets. The useful ones are those that
simplify the
Expressions place expensive operations by cheaper ones.
X = X+ 0
X=X*1
13. What is meant by register descriptors and address descriptors?
A register descriptor keeps track of what is currently in each register. It
is consulted whenever a new register is needed.
An address descriptor keeps track of the location where ever the
current Value of the name can be found at run time. The location might be a
register, a Stack location, a memory address,
14. What are the actions to perform the code generation
algorithms?
Invoke a function get reg to determine the location L.
Consult the address descriptor for y to determine y, the current
location of y.
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If the current values of y and/or z have no next uses, are not live on
exit from the block, and are in register, alter the register descriptor.
15. Write the labels on nodes in DAG.
A DAG for a basic block is a directed acyclic graph with the following
Labels on nodes:
Leaves are labeled by unique identifiers, either variable names or
constants.
Interior nodes are labeled by an operator symbol.
Nodes are also optionally given a sequence of identifiers for labels.
16. Give the applications of DAG.
Automatically detect the common sub expressions
Determine which identifiers have their values used in the
block.
Determine which statements compute values that could be
used outside the blocks.
17. Define Peephole optimization.
A Statement by statement code generation strategy often produces
target code that contains redundant instructions and suboptimal constructs.
Optimizing is misleading because there is no guarantee that the resulting
code is optimal. It is a method for trying to improve the performance of the
target program by examining the short sequence of target instructions and
replacing this instructions by shorter or faster sequence.
18. Write the characteristics of peephole optimization?
Redundant-instruction elimination
Flow-of-control optimizations.
Algebraic simplifications
Use of machine idioms
19. What are the structure preserving transformations on basic
blocks?
Common sub-expression elimination
Dead-code elimination
Renaming of temporary variables
Interchange of two independent adjacent statement
21. Define Common sub-expression elimination with ex.
It is defined as the process in which eliminate the statements which
has the same expressions. Hence this basic block may be transformed into
the equivalent Block.
Ex:
a : =b + c b
:=a - d
c :=b + c
After elimination:
a : =b + c b
:=a - d
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c :=a
22. Define Dead-code elimination with ex.
It is defined as the process in which the statement x=y+z appear in a
basic block, where x is a dead that is never subsequently used. Then this
statement maybe safely removed without changing the value of basic blocks.
23. Define Renaming of temporary variables with ex.
We have the statement u:=b + c ,where u is a new temporary variable,
and change all uses of this instance of t to u, then the value of the basic
block is not changed.
24. Define reduction in strength with ex.
Reduction in strength replaces expensive operations by equivalent
cheaper ones on the target machines. Certain machine instructions are
cheaper than others and can often be used as special cases of more
expensive operators.
Ex:
X^2 is invariably cheaper to implement as x*x than as a call to an
exponentiation routine.
25. Define use of machine idioms.
The target machine may have harder instructions to implement certain
specific operations efficiently. Detecting situations that permit the use of
these instructions can reduce execution time significantly.
26. Define code optimization and optimizing compiler
The term code-optimization refers to techniques a compiler can
employ in an attempt to produce a better object language program than the
most obvious for a given source program. Compilers that apply codeimproving transformations are called Optimizing-compilers.

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